Andres Iniesta, Candido Mendez and Catalina Garcia, awards “Rural Pride” 2016
The Rural Studies Foundation, established within the Union of Small Farmers (UPA), will deliver on 6th July in Madrid the awards which grants every year to individuals or institutions who have excelled for their support to the rural world. This year, the awards in the category “Rural Pride”, have been given to the footballer Andrés Iniesta, union leader Cándido Méndez, and the president of rural women Fademur Extremadura, Catalina García.
The Foundation for Rural Studies has begun to fail the awards given each year to individuals or institutions that stand out for their support for the rural world. Regarding the awards in the category “Rural Pride”, failed last June 28th, the board of trustees of the Foundation underlined its support and work for the progress of the Spanish countryside.
Biographical sketch of the winners
The former general secretary of the General Union of Workers (UGT) and union leader Cándido Méndez, born in Badajoz in 1952, will receive one of the awards “Rural Pride”. The Foundation for Rural Studies has rated Méndez as one of the main protagonists of the ‘workers struggle’ in Spain in the last four decades. “In his more than twenty years as head of the General Union of Workers, Cándido Méndez highlighted by never forgetting the importance of rural areas for the future and progress of our country,” they have pointed out.
Another award “Rural Pride” has been awarded to Catalina García Reyes, for hes long career in front of the defense of rural women in Extremadura. García is an agricultural engineer and mother of two children. She combines her work as head of a holding olives, cereal and vineyard in Ribera del Fresno (Badajoz) with the Secretary of Wine in UPA-UCE Extremadura. She is also president of Fademur Extremadura and some months she has managed to be the first woman who becomes part of the Control Board of the Designation of Origin Ribera del Guadiana as secretary thereof, a milestone in the sector which represents “a watershed before and after” of the role of women in representative bodies and decision of the agricultural and livestock sector.
The Soccer player Andres Iniesta and manchego vitner will receive another prize in this category. Born in Fuentealbilla, in the heart of La Manchuela (Albacete), Andres Iniesta has emerged as a clear advocate of its rural origins and benefits of their land. According to the FER, beyond his “footballing expertise and personal integrity” who have accompanied him on his already long career, Iniesta has been for years “an example of entrepreneurship” in rural areas. From Bodega Iniesta and 120 hectares of vineyard produces wines with his family and creating high quality jobs and economic activity on their land. Rural Studies Foundation has recognized with this award one of the best athletes in the history of our football, in addition to driver of the agriculture of his land, thanks to his family winery
“Esteban Lopez Plaza” Award
The latest award has been released on the cacereño journalist J. R. Alonso de la Torre, who will receive the “Esteban Lopez Plaza” award of the Foundation, in the category of Journalism and Communication.
With this award, the Foundation has recognized the work of this writer and intellectual as chronicler of rural areas, “which seamlessly combines travel journalism with the folk literature”. According to the board of the foundation, De la Torre is a “seasoned narrator of life stories of our rural areas” which captures every day since 2005, on the back of the newspaper Hoy, entitled “A country that never it’s over”.
The prize of Journalism and Communication of the founding of UPA bears the name “Esteban Lopez Plaza”, in memory of the former press chief of the Union of Small Farmers and Ranchers from 1996 to 2008, and recognized figure of agricultural journalism in our country. Cadena SER media or Efeagro Agency, as journalists Vidal Maté or Jorge Jaramillo and programs like Your Time of Roberto Brasero or Agropopular have received this award in its fifteen years of existence.
In the coming days will be known other awards granted by this Foundation in this 2016.
Source: UPA
